Open access licenses

We aim to provide the best choice of user license options which define how readers can reuse open access articles published on our platforms.

Elsevier's policy

Offer a choice between a commercial and a noncommercial Creative Commons license for gold open access articles in our proprietary titles. The choice is dependent on the journal in which the author chooses to publish. Please refer to the journal's homepage for specific details.

We support green open access and accepted manuscripts can be self -archived following our sharing guidelines and are required to attach a CC-BY-NC-ND license.

Choosing a license

Once selected, Creative Commons user licenses are non-revocable. We recommend authors check if their funding body requires a specific license. See the Creative Commons website for more details about what to consider before choosing a user license. Click here for a full list of user licenses used by Elsevier.

Please note: Under the CC BY-NC-ND license and for the Elsevier user license permitted 3rd party reuse is only applicable for non-commercial purposes. For further details on the rights granted to Elsevier see our copyright information or to obtain permission for commercial use see our permission information. Also note further permission may be required from the rights owner for any content within an article that is identified as belonging to a third party.